Demons in the Bedroom - Lidiya Foxglove Page 0,1

locked up—no inside views before the auction, so we were living on the edge here. You had to be a little crazy to do this, but I was a lot crazy. I started walking around the side, giving myself a little shake and casting a quick spell to recenter.

I thought I’d be the only wizard bidding on this house. I wondered who tipped them off, and why Kiersten would bother to work the east coast. But—so what if Kiersten and the Sullivan brothers were here?

I want this house.

She was really a beauty, this house. We were out in the middle of nowhere, rural Pennsylvania, always a hot spot for magical activity. The house stood on forty acres, mostly forest. It was all wood with three brick chimneys. The way the rooflines were pitched steep as a church with spires on top and simple gingerbread trim like lace dripping down suggested Carpenter Gothic style, maybe 1870s. But I could hear some human buyers murmuring with confusion, trying to place the style, because the architecture was quirky, with random diamond and octagon shaped windows. I knew at a glance that they were placed to catch certain placements of the moon on sacred days. A sure sign that this house was originally built by a wizard.

I could feel it. The energy of the spells cast here. The loving care of its original builders. They would have been warlocks too. I loved to imagine when houses were new and you could still smell the fresh paint. Wizards lived a long time, so I guessed this house had probably only had two or three owners across its lifetime.

Kiersten wasn’t going to think of stuff like that. She’ll just start tearing the old girl to shreds.

There was a lot I could tell from the outside with a few quick spells and simple observation. My familiar was a bat, and he knew what to do. I summoned him wordlessly and he swept up toward the attic to get a closer look. Bevan was a creature of few words.

Another quick spell told me the ground under the house was solid. That was borne out by the lack of serious foundation cracks in the stone the house was built upon.

No electricity, except for a very basic off-grid solar system to power a few lights and a fridge. Water from a cistern and a passive solar water heater on the roof. The place was owned by an old-school wizard who wanted to stay entirely off the grid and away from the toxic effects of electricity on magic. The human buyers were muttering. And Kiersten wasn’t going to like it either. She was what I thought of as ‘nouveau witche’. She would give up some of her magic for the comforts of the modern world. And she would make this place look picture perfect. Granite countertops, shiplap, barn doors. She would probably make a lot more money than I would.

Well, it wasn’t about money for me. It was about the integrity of the old house and the residual magic of the wizard who lived there.

Really gives her a damn advantage in an auction, though, I thought bitterly.

But maybe this location would be too remote for her taste. And with the power I felt emanating from the walls of this place, there could be a treasure. I made money from the first house I ever flipped, not off the house, but because I sensed something inside. It turned out to be a collection of antique wands forgotten inside some junky boxes in the attic. The antique dealer found me a buyer easily.

I hated to lose this house. It spoke to me. But I had to be careful and make some actual money. I was living out my truck.

I opened the doors to the garden to get a look. The garden was surrounded by a high wooden fence, and it was large. A real secret garden. Complete with the crazy overgrowth. It needed help. Lots of sweaty days with trimmers and pulling out weeds. Still, all the magical plants and healing herbs my buyers would want were already in place, some of them twining around statuary. I lifted aside some grape vines to reveal a little shrine for the spirits tucked away with offerings of shells and stones and a tiny liquor flask.

“That’s so sweet,” I whispered. I didn’t see offerings for spirits much. The wizard who owned the place must have been very old. I could feel the energy of this place,